The Strangergod
by EclecticParrot
Summary: He served his sentence, and rejoins a society that has changed in his absence. Even as he becomes the perfect citizen once more, he knows he's left something behind on Azkaban's dark shores. DISCONTINUED.
1. The Slowness of Death

**The Strangergod**  
**By: **Melnivone  
**Prologue: **The Slowness of Death

* * *

"Grand treason."

The accused sat in a chair, bound to it so securely the very texture of the backrest's rungs was ingrained into his back.  
The accusers stood, forming a ring around their captive.

"Wholesale slaughter of Muggles."

The interrogator's voice was a monotone, strictly neutral. He merely recited the crimes without attaching any real emotion to the words.

"The murder of thirty-seven wizards and witches."

The bound man ignored him, instead choosing to inspect his restraints. Iron shackles encircling his wrists and ankles hampered his freedom of movement. He flexed his magic, but to his disappointment found it unresponsive. Inert. Likely due to the magic-suspension wards inscribed everywhere across the floor and walls. They were hewn into the stone as hexagrams, geometric star shapes with six points, each of which bore a diagram.

He could barely discern the details of the diagrams from that distance, but saw that each of them corresponded to a field of magic. The diagrams on the points representing Transfiguration depicted mice and humans. Those on the opposite points showed feathers floating on bundles of air, representing Charms.

Skeletons adorned the lowest points, bones bent at impossible angles. Those points flared scarlet as the wards neutralized his efforts to stir his magic. A faint hum drifted throughout the holding chambers as they activated. The scribe writing the transcription of the interrogation and the other wizards in attendance shifted in unease, though their leader remained unperturbed.

The skeleton figure corresponded to the Dark Arts_._

Judging by the intensity of the light they emitted, Harry strained the suspension wards to their limits.

The question flitted at the back of their minds: if the wards failed for any reason, what manner of magics would they face?

It was unlikely they would ever find out. The wards were fueled by the incense that hung thick in the air. It was ground from Kingsfrond, a herb native to the Mediterranean and identifiable by the silvery veins marking its leaves. It possessed unique magical properties which included the function of powering wards.

The fragrance and the smoke wafting to every corner of the rom emanated from incense coils that hung above. From his vantage point directly below them, they resembled spirals, beginning at where the material was connected with a chord attached to the ceiling and then widening. Glowing embers traveled along the spiral, smoldering and burning away the incense at a languid pace. The coils had been set alight at the start of the interrogation. They could burn for extended periods of time, hours and even days, rendering him harmless.

Merely taking his wand posed more of a nuisance than a limitation - the Inner Circle members wielded such control over their emotions they could work themselves into a rage with Occlumency, the heightened anger allowing them some freedom with wandless magic.

His captors were free to do what they pleased with their magic though. Blots of dried blood dotted the central portion of the hexagrammic wards, shed by every member of the interrogation party. Blood magic exempted anyone who had bled onto the wards from being targeted.

The speaker continued, assured that his subject was helpless, and that he was not.

"The creation of five Horcruxes."

At last, a hint of nervousness crept into the interrogator's tone.

Harry Potter smiled serenely, tilting his head in acknowledgment.

The scribe muttered under his breath, as if marveling at how far Potter had fallen.

Albus Dumbledore, after defeating Grindelwald, had famously likened winning the trust of the populace to climbing a hill. The initial uphill climb was pure toil, spent facing distrust and mockery. Once cresting that hill, gravity worked with rather than against him. The comparison was remarkably insightful. Dumbledore, after achieving the deeds that made him legend, was rarely questioned. From the Wizengamot to the Order of the Phoenix, all accepted his decisions without reservation. The same could have applied to Harry. At a certain point his heroics were undeniable and the slander and ridicule disappeared from the press. A little longer and he would have been the most respected wizard in the Isles.

To think, all that loyalty squandered after fighting so hard for it. He had already owned the hearts of the people, but chose to be reviled instead of beloved.

Perhaps Harry knew it, even regretted it.

For a moment, the scarlet lights flickered as his efforts at reaching his magic slackened.

The interrogator scrutinized his subject.

The first thing about his appearance that struck Head Explicator Alexander Maazel was that Harry looked as if his soul was whole.

He distinctly remembered Voldemort's features. The structure of his face was blurred, as if the contours were carved into wax. His eyes were tinted with a demonic crimson, and his skin colored an unnatural paleness that bordered on gray, as if suffering from necrosis. The general rule was that the more Horcruxes created, the more misshapen the appearance of their creators became. Harry possessed the pallor, but there was too much definition in his cheeks and chin, and his eyes were as green as ever. He looked human, charming even.

How had he preserved his image?**  
**How had he succeeded in doing what Voldemort had not even attempted?

"Each of these deeds are punishable by death. Your lesser crimes by imprisonment."

The scarlet light that bathed them vanished abruptly. Harry had stopped trying to assert his magic.

The smile wavered.

"We are going to kill you four times," Maazel explained, steepling his fingers. "Spells such as the Killing Curse can force the soul to leave without inflicting a mark on the body. But your soul is no longer complete. It opens interesting possibilities. Who knows how long it might be forced to stay? You see, there are consequences to tampering with Horcruxes. You brought this upon yourself. Had you not broached the boundaries, you would be facing a kinder fate."

The former Head of the Auror Office's face whitened further.

Maazel leaned across the desk towards him. He longed to end Harry's existence, but doing so invited disaster and wasn't very possible anyway.

He mastered himself and, taking a deep breath, soldiered on.

"I offer you the chance to die but once. Tell us the locations of your Horcruxes and how to dismantle their defenses. We will destroy them, and you may die with some amount of honor intact."

Harry would not divulge his secrets, of course. Not to _him._

They were not only colleagues in the Ministry of Magic, but peers in the Inner Circle of the Death Eaters.

Maazel grimaced, resisting the impulse to touch his left arm where the Dark Mark throbbed under the sleeve of his robes, burning with Voldemort's anticipation.

_Those Horcuxes are precious_, the pulsation seemed to say.

He did not know all the details. Harry had sacrificed much to gain the Dark Lord's trust, but he had done it only for one purpose. Voldemort had appointed Harry Potter his lieutenant only after making him a Horcrux. It was equivalent to shackling them together with the same chain, ensuring that Harry would not betray him. Sealing their alliance. Harry would have to commit suicide in order to kill Voldemort for good. The plan seemed sound in theory.

Unfortunately, all plans, no matter how well-conceived, came with their complications.

The Power Known Not referred to in the prophecy being an excellent example.

By becoming a vessel of a soul fragment, Harry had broadened the connection between his mind and Voldemort's to encompass their very souls. Harry had created five Horcruxes, to correspond to the five constructed by Voldemort that still remained. If he knew little about the situation, Maazel knew nearly nothing at all about the mechanics, except for the basics. If one of Harry's was to be destroyed, so then would one of Voldemort's follow.

The locations of Voldemort's Horcruxes were unknown and their protections formidable, but such measures were meaningless unless Harry's were similarly guarded.

The war favored the Dark Lord at the moment. Voldemort amassed ever increasing numbers of new followers and the Ministry was weakening, but that advantage could disappear overnight. Harry might have sent agents to retrieve his own Horcruxes and to destroy them. At worst, they were already gone, in which case Voldemort's survival was wholly dependent on Harry's, as the final Horcrux. At best, the Aurors had captured Harry before he could set his plan into motion.

Either way, killing him outright was out of question.

Harry Potter smirked knowingly.

"Not while we are in the same room."

"I could leave," Maazel suggested. "I will take an Oath, to leave the Ministry and retire to my home for the evening. There are plenty of Explicators eager to take my place. You may request whomever you wish."

Harry considered his proposal, then turned to the other wizards of the interrogation party, addressing the scribe.

"What say you, good sir?"

The young man holding the quill froze in mid-scribble, and merely stared at the opposite wall vacantly, mouth falling open. The delay confirmed Harry's suspicions.

"No, Maazel," he said gently, "Whether you stay or leave makes no difference when your entire staff is Imperiused."

Maazel openly clutched his forearm, relieved to drop the facade. Pretense got tiresome, especially when it was pointless. He briefly wondered whether Harry's Mark was similarly heated, before turning his mind to the matter at hand. The most ideal option eliminated, he considered those that remained. He could try to force the locations out, but he instinctively knew such efforts would be wasted.

Some men softened under torture, men like Potter hardened.

Explicators specialized in extracting information from unwilling minds, using a mixture of Legilimency and physical violence. The Dark Lord stringently conditioned his closest advisers against torture though, making Harry even less likely to yield to pain. Maazel knew for a fact that he himself would not break under the treatment of the Explicators. The same could be said for Harry, who he grudgingly admitted was the superior wizard.

"You leave me at an impasse."

Harry nodded somberly, mouth set in a thin line.

Slowly, Maazel drew his wand from its holster and slapped it down on the desk between them. Fingering it while Harry watched silently, he considered his next course of action. Harry had always been a nuisance of a rival, vying for the Dark Lord"s favor.

The corners of his lips curved into a bloodthirsty smile.  
He snatched up his wand, and with his other hand he gestured to his companions.

Harry Potter's slow death began in earnest.

* * *

**_To Be Continued_**

* * *

The term Explicator is from Grey Knight by Ben Counter, a Warhammer 4000 novel.


	2. Sentiment of an Invisible Omniscience

**The Strangergod**  
**By:** Melnivone_  
_**Chapter I:** Sentiment of an Invisible Omniscience

* * *

Only footsteps and their faint echoes were audible above the clamor of crashing waves.

They went ignored by most of the prisoners within earshot. Hope rose and fell as easily as the tide, if they were even capable of mustering that higher emotion.

Mildew and moss-ridden walls separated the prisoners from each other, imposing an isolation that was utterly complete. Their vocal chords were impaired upon incarceration, making speaking a futile endeavor. The silence they could not break was almost as unbearable as the Dementors that roamed at will, interrupted only by the distant tinkling of keys.

Most fell victim to the dual threats, one or the other. If not outright insanity then to a mindless stupor.

Only a handful of prisoners stirred.

Wintry green eyes belonging to one of them opened.

Their owner laid spreadeagled on his back and the sight that greeted him accordingly was a keystone, sculpted into the stern visage of Praxidice, the Exacter of Justice. It was set at the apex of the masonry archway of his cell, locking into place the voussoir stones. His cell was restrictive in the two dimensions that mattered: length and width, while it was expansive in the only dimension that did not: height. Halfway from the ground to the underside of the tower, a portcullis mounted on vertical grooves on the wall hemmed him in. Above that the counter-weights hung from chains well beyond his reach.

The prisoner pushed himself upright, and his gaze - always turned inward, never outward when he awoke - shifted lower. The hypnotic waves of the North Sea visible behind him invited his contemplation, but he could not turn his back on the spectacle at his fore.

Azkaban was a panopticon.

Through the latticed grilles of the portcullis, he could see the curvature of the Azkaban's circular structure. The rim encompassed a radius of a thousand yards, divided into nine levels of cells that extended the entire thickness of the wall. Central to the circle was a watchtower. It was layered on a multitude of tiers with multiple eaves and jutted from the surface of the water, which sluiced against its base in constant reminder that Azkaban was adrift at sea. The occupant of each cell was backlit, separated from each other, and subjected to the scrutiny of an unseen observer in the tower at the center of the circle.

It was not so elaborate originally.

At first, Azkaban was built as a conventional prison, boasting walls, gates, guardhouses, and innumerable cellblocks.

It functioned splendidly during peacetime, but its flaw became glaring when the Dark Lord declared war. The corridors and battlements needed dozens of guards to patrol them, and those very same personnel were needed on the field, launching raids and responding to Death Eater attacks. Too many were tied up at Azkaban, blunting the war effort. Redesigned as a panopticon, there was only the need for a single observer, stationed in that tower. Much more efficient.

The prisoner fancied he saw the glint of a telescope trained on him, and unconsciously shrunk back against the wall in an effort to disappear into the threadbare blankets and mattress. He peered closer, but was thwarted by the Venetian blinds that covered the viewports. He had never seen whatever entity inhabited that tower, not once. Flocks of seagulls frequently roosted on the decorative brackets at the ends of the eaves, but they were never scattered, their nests never disturbed.

More than once he contemplated the possibility of the tower being empty. It made sense, he reasoned, to turn the mentality of the prisoners to their advantage. The inability to well whether they were being watched or not conveyed what the architect of the panoptic prison design, the philosopher and social reformist Jeremy Bentham, called the "sentiment of an invisible omniscience."

He instinctively knew that the paranoia was justified. Every time he convinced himself that nothing watched him, he felt a weight settle on him, the same sensation he experienced whenever Dumbledore pinned him with a penetrating stare. He felt it too keenly for it to be an illusion.

Someone kept a watchful vigil, and paid more attention to a certain prisoner than to any other.

His gaze lowered to the ledge on the other side of the portcullis, narrowing as a hand appeared and latched onto it.

Its fingers were spindly and a lifeless gray, their joints exposed through decayed tendons and wasted flesh. Another hand appeared beside the first, and a Dementor slowly dragged itself upright to stand on the ledge. Its face was hidden beneath the shadows cast by the cowl, but its stare was more felt than seen. The prisoner straightened his back, meeting where he thought its eyes were with his own challengingly.

He shivered once and dim memories began to resurface.

A cradle ceasing its gentle rocking motion.  
A plea for mercy_, _voice drowned in hysteria.  
Streams of green light enveloping a father and a mother.

Worse memories supplanted them, making them seem pale in comparison.

A wand of holly being turned on defenseless Muggles.**  
**A wand of holly being turned on defenseless _wizards_.

_Not really defenseless, _he mused.

No less than seventeen of his Muggle victims had wielded guns. It wasn't his fault he had simply summoned their small-arms. The officers amassed at Surrey weren't defenseless at first - he had _rendered_ them defenseless. There was a difference, fine though it was.

The wizards and witches were only negligibly different - he'd pried their wands loose from fingers stiffening with rigor-mortis. They posed a greater challenge, but they all fell in the end.

Such power came with a price, however. He had paid it to Tom Riddle. At first, the Dark Lord had refused to give him an audience. He already knew who his allies and enemies were, he did not need them switching categories.

He had to show he meant his change of heart, something adequately achieved when he massacred the inhabitants of Little Whinging.

The Dursleys.  
_Them first._  
Their insufferable neighbors. **  
**_Them next.  
_**Then everyone. ****  
**The end.

_That _had gotten the Dark Lord's attention.

Through a savage exertion of will, the prisoner quelled the unpleasant memories that refused to stay buried.

He wasn't in the mood to relive them.

The Dementor reached for the winch on the other side of the portcullis, its hand tracing the axle before coming to a rest on the shaft. Cranking it would lift the only obstruction between them.

His heartbeat quickened from its lethargic pace and a slight knot of tension had formed between his shoulders.

When push came to shove, he did not want to lose the remainder of his tattered soul.

The creature's stare lingered awhile before roving upward and it released its hold on the shaft. Its hands moved to the grilles of the portcullis and the Dementor quickly scaled up it and the chains atop it, disappearing from sight. The prisoner had never kept the Dementors' interest for long. They fed on happiness and hope - wrath was an acquired taste, apparently.

He cocked his head to the side, angling his ear to the arched ceiling. Judging by the gravelly sound of another portcullis lifting and the pulley hoisting the chains, the occupant of his cell above his own had the misfortune of being sentenced to a Kiss. He heard nothing. Perhaps the unlucky fellow was subdued by the aura of the Dementor - but then he heard things.

The frantic rattling of the bed-frame against the wall livened his quarters as fists swung through a cloak with no flesh to harm underneath.

Due to the complete absence of voices, the scuffle seemed almost civilized. How would it feel, to face the certainty of death and not be able to cry out in fear? Or beg for mercy, if only from the merciless?

The mortal struggle being waged nearby reminded him of his own state. Slim fingertips thoughtfully massaged his throat, raspy from disuse. He struggled to remember the last words he'd spoken.

What had they been?

_"Please."_  
He hadn't begged. He was rightfully condemned.  
_"Believe me.__"_  
Believe what? That he was innocent? Speaking of which -  
_"I'm innocent._"  
No. He was no liar.

He dismissed them possibilities one after the other - he could not remember. Peeled his lips back in a snarl, too. Threw an - ironically - wordless tantrum.

_I have no mouth and I must scream._

The desperate prisoner from the neighboring cell hurled himself off the ledge, choosing to brave a hundred-foot drop rather than the Dementor come to take his soul.

_Poorly-chosen,_ the listener mentally tutted.

He would have chosen the Dementor.  
The Prisoner-in-the-cell-above had chosen the _Dementors_.

He caught a fleeting glimpse of the man's panicked face as the body folded and inverted in the air. He judged the poor fellow to have just reached midlife - or the end of it, given the predicament. It was open to interpretation. The plummeting man's vector was almost horizontal for the first few moments, before his trajectory abruptly curved downward, bowing to gravity. The splash that followed was quite the spectacle, frothing water roiling away from the point of impact. The ripples flowing outward gradually subsided, and a flailing figure emerged.

The wizard sputtered and strove to stay afloat in the frigid water. He looked frantically from side to side, as if bewildered at his survival. When he calmed, he stared upward, at where the Dementor now stood. It made no attempt to follow.

The triumph was short-lived.

Shapes began to darken, rising from the depths.

The Dementor had not followed the prisoner. There was no need.

Hundreds of its brethren surfaced, hoods and sleeves draped low, weighed down by water. Droplets cascaded, running freely from their forms. They surrounded the lone human in their midst, the focal point for their overwhelming aura. So many in one place, and so near, it was a wonder the prisoner was not immediately paralyzed. The cold intensified, and in a final act of desperation the wizard made for the tower so tantalizingly within reach. He managed a single stroke, which took him into the waiting arms of a Dementor. Emaciated arms wrapped around the frail figure, and the black-clad fiends flocked to them en masse. There was no sense of dimension - they pressed their wraith-like bodies more closely than physically possible. They seemed to dissolve together into a vast inkblot, swirling in the water corralled by the grim enclosure of Azkaban's superstructure.

They caressed.  
They embraced.  
They Kissed.

The escapee disappeared, sinking without resistance beneath the surface of the water.

The Dementors followed.

The water regained its earlier tranquility.

Losing interest, the prisoner focused his attention on the footsteps. They were much nearer now, and approached from the southwestern end of the walkway outside. From observation he knew that the Dementors made their rounds from the opposite direction. The footfalls sounded firmer too, not the hollow-like steps of the wraiths. That, coupled with the sound of rustling from the other cells as mute prisoners attempted to attract attention, led him to the inevitable conclusion.

Someone was going to be set free.

Harry Potter began tapping the wall beside his head, fingers following the rhythm set by his first visitor in five years.


	3. Luciferase

**The Strangergod**  
**By: **Melnivone_  
_**Chapter II:** Luciferase

* * *

Moisture lashed the official and the members of his escort, drenching their cloaks and the exposed fingers that clutched the fabric. His teeth chattered and the taste of seawater found its way into his mouth. He muttered an incantation that renewed the warmth and water-repelling charms imbuing his clothing. His footing was precarious; he followed his guide with caution. The Dementor leading the way was undisturbed by the cold and paused patiently whenever he lagged behind.

Azkaban's architects made a number of departures from the standard panoptic design. Most notably, Bentham had envisioned a landlocked prison, not a seaborne one. Magic opened the door to a wealth of possibilities, one of which was realized in the stone slabs that circled Azkaban. Networks of them hovered in loose ring-shaped formations that bordered the walls.

Nine of these rings allowed external access to the cells, all of them incomplete.

That last fact worried the official to no end as he looked longingly to the rowboat that had ferried him to the prison. The voyage from the shore to the prison had taken only an hour, shortened by the use of propulsion spells. After disembarking and stepping onto the lowest of the rings, their rowman had steered his vessel around with a series of oar-strokes. the propulsion spells took effect once the turn was completed and launched it into the distance.

He couldn't spare too many moments gazing after the rowboat, not with the constant movement of the slabs beneath his feet. As he approached, the stones interlocked, becoming flush with one another to form a walkway.

The waves broke upon the worn but sheer surface of Azkban's walls. The surf climbed higher sometimes and overlapped their feet before receding. They never reached past their knees though, as the stones responded by rising a little higher, taking them beyond reach of the tide. He had looked forward to the stability of the stones after enduring the endless lurching motion of the rowboat, but was disappointed. The stones possessed an alarming quality of giving slightly under his weight and only returning to their previous height after he stepped off. If one of the Aurors at his back followed too soon, the stone would sink further, slowing their progress to a crawl.

The official had not fallen behind and so did not expect the Dementor to halt abruptly. Unwittingly he bumped into its back, and experienced a fleeting sensation of being ensnared in a mesh net. Like a screen drawn taut across a doorway, stretching forward a little before launching him back. Iciness began to spread over his chest where he had touched it, and the official stumbled backward. The Auror behind him caught him by the arm. He regained his balance and mumbled his thanks. The Dementor gave no indication of annoyance and merely stood still, in silent communication with something.

He lifted his chin and glanced over the Dementor's shoulder - the creature was remarkably tall - and saw that they had reached a gap. The walkway resumed nearly ten feet on the other side of it, curving out of view to conform to the circular shape of the prison. The human delegation shuffled behind its guide, unsure of what to expect.

Then, with a faint tremor, a length of the walkway detached, and the stones levitated _upward_, slotting into a gap in the ring above. The Dementor continued at a brisker pace and the party followed more at ease now that they were well above the waves. They repeated the process, gradually ascending the rings. The walkways ended unpredictably, sometimes immediately and other times only after they had traversed nearly a complete circuit. They were patternless as far as the official could see - the official deduced that dead ends would appear underneath the gaps in the rings above, but as if sensing his thoughts, the stones in the upper levels shifted, reforming gaps elsewhere.

Azkaban's outer rings were non-Static, an architectural term that meant they were not fixed in a certain place and could reconfigure themselves. Azkaban was structurally simplistic - a circle and a tower central to it - so its fluidity, though greater than its Muggle equivalents, was limited. With more complex strongholds such as Hogwarts however, things could get fanciful. The stairways at Hogwarts connected at balconies and floors wherever the students wished to be taken, but forced infiltrators into continual loops.

The official kept his gaze firmly ahead at first but could not prevent it straying sideways out of curiosity. A montage of gaunt faces greeted him. Heads thudded against the reinforced glass of the windows and he saw wide eyes and bared teeth. Mouths shaped words but failed to vocalize them. Silhouettes lurked in the corners of the cells and bodies propped against motionlessly against the walls like dolls.

Scowling at the portrait of human misery stretched out before him, he looked in the opposite direction, to the horizon. A distant speck was all he could make of the rowboat that had brought him to Azkaban. The violent tide nearly overturned it, and it was kept aloft only by its enchanted hull.

The Dementor stopped outside the cell containing the prisoner they sought, and reached into the bottomless darkness pooled beneath its cowl.  
Its hand retrieved a fistful of frayed black threads that clung to its face - thinning as it was stretched before snapping - and the Dementor molded it into the shape of a key. **  
**The official accepted it from the Dementor. It hardened, and he inserted it into the lock.

The curse impairing Harry's vocal chords lifted.

* * *

He noticed.

He had expected his breathing to ease a little, not to worsen. Nor had he expected his chest to flare alive with pain either. A cough, heavy with spittle, forced its way past his lips. Perspiration began to gather at his brow and his core temperature rose.

_What the fuck? _A moment ago he had been healthy and now he was a feverish wreck. Dimly, he realized the footsteps had fallen silent, replaced by the metallic groans rumbling from the door. The red dust of iron oxides spilled from the grilles in the door as its internal locks unfastened.

It swung inward, and Harry stared in disbelief as his visitor stepped inside.

"Oh surely not. They sent a _Malfoy _to liberate me?"

"I'll not lie. That was exactly the sort of welcome I was expecting," Draco Malfoy said, removing his hat in a mocking gesture of respect.

His frosty exterior lasted until the sound of his own voice registered. It was foreign to his ears, utterly unrecognizable and ringing with some raw, inner emotion he couldn't identify. Intrigued, he sat still and quietly muttered under his breath, listening carefully to himself. A small smile then formed on his lips. It widened as he began to guffaw uproariously.

_I sound like a damn scarecrow._

He had no idea what a scarecrow might sound like but that didn't stop him from making the comparison. He climbed to his feet and was satisfied to note he was an inch or so taller than Malfoy even after years spent rotting away. Malfoy did not back down, but _did _clutch his wand tighter. Harry's laughter died away and he glared at Malfoy. What did the other wizard have to fear? He was wandless and in no condition to be casting spells, even if he could still properly pronounce Latin.

The hysteria faded.

"I suppose this means Voldemort won," he said flatly.

He could not fathom Malfoy being selected by the Ministry to retrieve him unless it was under Voldemort's control.

His strength deserted him entirely and he flung himself back onto the mattress. He had considered the outcome coming to pass during his imprisonment. If his agents had succeeded in tracking and destroying his Horcruxes, all that was left was for him to kill himself. It should be a simple matter, a painless Killing Curse and none of the failure inherent in slashing wrists. Was that why Draco had not killed him yet, because Voldemort had instructed him not to?

"No, actually. The Dark Lord is gone."

Harry blinked in puzzlement.

"Gone?" he asked, stifling the giggle that threatened to erupt at the absurdity of the prospect. _He is never _gone. _You just don't know any better._ "Not to flaunt the fact that I was ranked higher in the Death Eaters or anything, but I would know if he was gone or not. He isn't, you little lying wretch."

He made no effort at prudence. He had done too much worrying his life to care about the future of the Wizarding World. Still, there was something pitiable about the reversal of roles. Harry had never thought he would be the one reduced to petty insults while Draco refused to take the bait. The insults slipped right past his nonexistent self-control, eroded to nothing by years of solitude.

Draco bristled and his eyes flashed with their schoolyard enmity. They were placid an instant later and the wizard smiled condescendingly, no doubt aware of the irony in the affront. Harry shrugged and began toying with a loose thread from the sheets. He wound it around his fingers in an attempt to form the web structures he had seen children make.

He stared at his hands, keeping his gaze downcast to hide a smug smile.

_Loop it around the index and forefingers…_

Draco could enjoy looming over him in his stately robes, but it had no impact on Harry. Not when he could recall a dozen instances when he had outperformed the other wizard. Unlike Draco, he had never hesitated in killing an enemy after rendering him helpless, as Draco had with Dumbledore. Harry had never given Voldemort cause for disappointment, not until his treachery. It did not matter whether one pursued the path of the righteous or evil, but whether one did so with conviction. Draco had been desperate to leave Voldemort's service for months, kept only to amuse the Dark Lord and anchored by the dilemma of escaping without sacrificing his mother.

Harry looked more wretched at the moment, but he would never be the inferior man.

He separated his hands, pulling the string taut in the shape of a rectangle. He rotated his left hand and folded the rectangle over itself to form an hourglass. A little more complexity and he would have a snare he could trigger if someone stuck his wrist through it.

"Not dead," Draco clarified. "_Gone_. Abandoned the Death Eaters the year after you were sent to Azkaban. The public doesn't know any better, of course…"

His fingers were tangled uselessly in the strand. A pulse of pain wracked his mind, causing the mishap.

_Ah. _

That made more sense. Marginally.

The Dark Mark had twinged as recently as a week ago, so Voldemort was still active and in bodily form. The end of his first year of imprisonment coincided with the Dementors returning to their posts, ending their revolt from his fifth year at Hogwarts. For all its problems and the dire straits it navigated, the Ministry would not accept the Dementors without a very solid reason.

But the idea of Voldemort disappearing was still outlandish. Why would he suddenly suspend his campaign? Was Voldemort researching magic related to the soul abroad, to see whether he could undo from Harry's trickery? And that _still _didn't answer why Draco was his liberator. He began to suspect an elaborate plot. If Voldemort had won, he could arrange whatever he wanted, including the return of the Dementors to Azkaban. Questions swam in his head, but he would find answers to none of them through speculation.

"You… don't seem very upset."

Draco did not look upset, he looked gleeful. His face alone showed nothing – he looked very mellow in fact – but Harry knew how to study signs. There was an amused glint in Malfoy's eye reminiscent of children watching ants on a sunny day. Their conversation, like those they had in Hogwarts, had turned into a confrontation, with Harry trying to ignore his ignorance of worldly affairs while Draco basked in his familiarity with them. Only, Draco could afford to be spineless and let himself be bullied about because nothing Harry could do or say could annoy him truly. Even if the ant bit, Draco controlled the magnifying glass. It was the malicious glee of an unruly child enjoying a joke he had no intention of sharing with Harry. Instinct told him Harry would find out, only not in the most ideal of circumstances.

"No," Draco said, smiling in agreement, "I have a reason to be happy. And – at long last, friend - so do you..."

Reaching into his robes, he produced a narrow box identical to those piled high in Ollivander's shop. Harry's eyes locked onto it raptly. It was a ravishing sight to him and excitement swelled in his chest, other emotions on its heels. His vision blurred with the dizziness induced by his fever and his anger that Malfoy had been entrusted with his beloved wand.

He uttered a guttural growl that was animalistic and Draco froze, allowing him to snatch the package from his hands.

Undoing the latch, he opened the box and thought he might weep when he saw the eleven inches of holly cushioned by purple velvet. His legs felt unsteady so he simply sat down and leaned against the wall. He traced a finger delicately over its length, reveling in the smoothness of the wood grain. He lifted it and held it above him so that it caught the light that streamed in and scrutinized the alignment of fibers exposed after two decades of use had worn away the thin coating of paint. His shoulders relaxed as he admired the sight. He marveled at how his memory had perfectly preserved the image of his wand, and his eyes flew along it, pinpointing each spiral. Some of the corkscrew shapes were interlocked nears the wandtip, where the growth rings of the holly tree from which the wand-wood was taken had misaligned.

It was beautiful, and it was his.

His familiarity with his wand was absolutely secure despite their separation, reassuring him and overwhelming his insecurities. The feeling of insignificance, reinforced night after night of knowing the world beyond his few feet of stone turned without him when once he was its axis, instantly dissipated. A changed world awaited him, this he suspected from Draco's unusual confidence, and some of the changes would surely displease him. They were meaningless. His wand, his most prized possession that remained to him, was the same. That was all that mattered.

If he didn't like the Wizarding World he was returning to, he could make adjustments.

"They never snapped it?" Harry asked as he gave it a swish and flick, delighting in its suppleness.

"No. Pius Thicknesse intervened on your behalf, citing the Brother Wand effect as an advantage of preserving it."

Harry tensed as he felt the invisible weight of the stare from the tower again, dampening his mood. He could take action this time. Turning to face it he muttered a spell hat caused the glass to frost over, obscuring the view. Ignoring Draco's questioning look, he strode to the window and pressed his finger to it at shoulder-height. He scrawled a message through the condensation. _Good-bye you damn voyeur. _

There was something cathartic about his crude farewell.

"I doubt they expected it to wind up with me again… How did they manage to secure my release? I thought it takes a two-thirds majority in the Wizengamot to approve a pardon."

"Oh I wouldn't know," Draco said with a vague hand gesture.

It must have taken a miracle. Other Death Eaters had won their freedom against all reason though; Harry supposed he wasn't going to complain.

His attention wandered back to his wand's container. In the wand-shaped mould, under where his wand had rested, glinted a brooch. A transparent layer of black and golden enamel decorated the decorative clasp. The Auror insignia was inlaid into the metal beneath the enamel surface, a wand crossing a morning star surrounded by a ring of light. A subtle glow emanated from the brooch, the same hue of the golden ring, making the halo indistinguishably light and metalwork.

"They are reinstating you as an Auror," Draco added as if in afterthought. "To your rank prior to your promotion. Earl Zwerling remains the Head of the Aurors.

Harry rubbed the brooch between his fingers, pensive as he felt the texture. The dark enamel was supposed to symbolize the Auror creed. Due to his efforts, that light had nearly been smothered. The thought of wearing it again amused him. The surviving members of his former subordinates, whose companions he had purposely gotten killed or grievously injured under a pretense of leadership, would no doubt be thrilled to have him back. At least the position he would assume was still lofty enough that Zwerling could not send him off on a suicide mission. They would have to work a little harder to get rid of him.

Something was fucked up beyond recognition however, if he was not only released at all but re-commissioned as an Auror.

His suspicions began to coalesce into the beginnings of paranoia.

"Society is really quite kind to you, giving you a job. It would be unfair otherwise, given the confiscation of your monetary assets."

The strengthening feeling of wrongness began to irritate him. Harry wondered whether this was a karma-induced payback for Lucius was put into Azkaban in his fifth year. That had indirectly begun the long downfall of the Malfoy family. The loss of credibility was the most harmful consequence, leading Voldemort to force Lucius to surrender all his assets.

"Well, that's everything," Draco said cheerfully. "The Aurors outside have a Portkey waiting for you. Every issue of the Daily Prophet since your incarceration has been archived in the Merlin Bibliotheca, so you have all you need to catch up."

Draco was slightly disconcerted by how Harry stared at him, tapping his chin thoughtfully as he did so.

_What can put a damper on his happiness, _he wondered to himself.

The answer occurred to him shortly.

He unrolled his left sleeve and bared his forearm.

"You know Malfoy, I committed a lot of petty atrocities, but this time I want to do it right. I figure a suitable first step would be to get rid of this little tattoo. Not very appropriate for an Auror, hmm?" he asked in a saccharine tone.

Clearing his throat of the phlegm accumulated there, he uttered a long sibilant hiss in Parseltongue and pressed his wand against his Dark Mark. A shorter hiss followed, but this time it was merely a hiss of pain. Crackles saturated the air and the Mark began to sizzle, the tattoo fluctuating as it solidified into an actual layer of a parched, leather-like substance. Draco stared wide-eyed at the sight, transfixed by the contortions of the tattoo. The slim lines of dark ink that defined the features of the snake's head darkened. In contrast, the vivid green and the red of the forked tongue in between the lines brightened. It reached a blinding intensity before it receded altogether.

The brand had hardened into a collection of gleaming scales that still steamed from the heat.

Harry gave it an idle flick.

Scales went scattering, exposing unblemished skin.

Un_Marked_ skin.

"How do _you _live with wearing that thing?" Harry asked with a wrinkle of his nose. "Seriously, the top of the snake's head look like testicles. Nearly made me change my mind when I took the Mark. I suppose it suits your preferences though."

Cradling his wand, he strolled onto the walkway outside his cell. He stretched, flinging his arms to either side and rolling his shoulders back. He began leaping as high as he could, bouncing in a delirious joy without regard for the sinking motion of the stone slabs supporting him.

He stretched, flinging his arms to either side and rolling his shoulders back.  
He began leaping as high as he could, bouncing in a delirious joy without regard for the sinking motion of the stone slabs supporting him.

_How do I feel,_ Harry pondered. _Enlivened?_ He decided to leave it at that when the Auror closest to him – expressionless and too young to have been employed until after his imprisonment - handed him a small clock that could fit in his palm.

He was happy to leave behind Draco sputtering and bewildered by his miraculous removal of the Dark Mark.

He was happier to leave behind the watchmen of his mind.

* * *

All too soon, Harry found himself lamenting the loss of his freedom as he arrived at the Portkey's destination. He landed with a thump that numbed his feet but managed to keep his balance. He swayed a bit as he cleared the dizziness. Stark white softened by oaken panels formed the walls of the narrow corridor. He glanced up and saw the familiar crystal bubbles containing candles hovering above. The closed double doors behind him bore a plaque that read: FOURTH FLOOR – SPELL DAMAGE.

The fourth floor of St. Mungo's Hospital for Magical Maladies and Injuries.

_What a freaking moodkiller_, he thought grumpily.

The noise indicated bustling activity in the lobby, and he did not want to cause a ruckus. He swiveled around as a door to a ward opened slightly and a youthful witch peered through the sliver. She looked cautious as she examined him, but seemed heartened by his less than frightening appearance.

"You're late." she said reproachfully.

Her demeanor was good-natured despite her chastisement.

She opened the door fully and stepped to the side, gesturing welcomingly for him to enter. A small pit of dread formed in his stomach as he took a tentative step towards her. She did not resemble any of his victims so it was unlikely she intended to avenge a slain relative, but that did little to reassure him. A rapid Killing Curse and another headstone would join those in the cemetery at Godric's Hollow.

None after that.

He shuffled inside, wand clenched in a grip that whitened the knuckles in his hand. He deserved the most spectacular fireworks display of a death – dying at the hand of a girl a decade his junior was unacceptable. But what a girl. She was of medium height, a few inches shorter than him. Her attire, a green cardigan bearing the symbol of medicine, a serpent entwined around a slender rod, a white blouse under that and a matching skirt, flattered her curves. Flaxen hair gathered at the nape of her neck in a ponytail.

She strode to a cabinet and opened it, stepping on tip-toe and rummaging through its contents.

His throat burned and let out a hacking noise, and he massaged it ruefully. Despite his aptitude for the combative fields of magic, he had little affinity for healing spells.

_Perhaps this visit was a necessary evil,_ Harry amended.

The coughing fit did not subside and alarmed, he cast a silencing charm. To his delight, not only did the coughs cease completely but the pains afflicting him vanished without a trace.

The nurse whirled around, expression livid.

"Undo that charm immediately, Mr. Potter."

Her voice rang commandingly as she crossed her arms beneath her ample chest. He wanted to ask why he should – only he could not verbalize anything unless he removed the charm.

_How very circular. _

Harry made a face as he cancelled the spell, dismayed as the constriction in his lungs returned full-force.

"You're fresh from Azkaban – pneumonia is a common case for pardoned prisoners," she said sweetly, bubbly once more.

"I got it in the last few minutes," Harry pointed out.

"Right, but only because of the silencing charm they placed on you," she explained. "It imposes an artificial condition on the lungs and prevents the vocal chords from vibrating. Otherwise, the breathing remains normal. Right after it lifted, your lungs reverted to its natural state, which unfortunately meant inflammation. This should cure it…"

She removed a crystal decanter filled with an amber-colored liquid from the shelf and lowered it onto the counter. Carefully she measured an amount of the mixture and poured it into a vial.

Suspicion bloomed in his mind as Harry accepted it from her and held it askance. It nearly escaped his notice, but the liquid shimmered while it sloshed around, flashing three colors in rapid succession. He hissed out of the corner of his mouth, and bubbles too miniscule to be noticeable to the nurse formulated near the surface, assuming the shape of a squiggle that split into three prongs. His gaze narrowed – it was the Parseltongue representation of a certain snake.

The mixture was tainted with extract from the Syracusan Trident breed of Runespoors.

The poison targeted the enzymes that created spells. Magic worked similarly to the biological concept of metabolic pathways – reactions catalyzed by a series of enzymes that were activated by syllables spoken either mentally or verbally. Hence the importance of incantations.

Face blank, he peered more closely at her. The girl dazzled him with a bright smile that revealed perfect white teeth, but her eyes were cold. Beyond the cordiality he glimpsed cruelty. Her eagerness was evident in how carefully she was watching him and how her smile widened the closer he brought the vial to his nose. Harry suppressed the shiver that traveled up his spine.

The poison would only act if he uttered a specific incantation, disrupting the reactions that shaped spells to disastrous consequence. This limitation made it only practical if the victim was susceptible to the Imperius. Otherwise, he needed to be manipulated into casting that fatal spell, or be dreadfully unlucky.

_Why choose this most finicky of poisons over all others? _

He debated over sparing her life.

Her smile quirked at the corners of her mouth devilishly. Not a trace of fear anywhere.

The urge to turn it upside down was barely quelled.

Smiling at her, he opened wide and tipped the vial, emptying its contents. The liquid slid down his gullet with a slosh.

Voldemort's teachings in Parseltongue allowed him to internalize the antidote to any poison of serpentine origin. Playing the unaware prey would give him an opportunity to survive an attempt to kill him – then he could take action accordingly.

_Hm, tastes like wine_, Harry thought, smacking his lips.

At least the potion worked, cleansing his throat and banishing the pressure on his lungs.

"Well, thanks," he said, feigning gratitude before he bolted for the door. "Since that is the only malady, I'm keen on returning to my home. I'll return if anything is amiss."

"My pleasure, Mr. Potter."

He had left Azkaban and wandered straight into an attempt to kill him not an hour afterward.

* * *

Guilty.

A unanimous ruling.

Harry wondered whether it was the pedophilia charge that cinched it.

The pedestal bearing him and the chair sank, lowering into a shaft hidden underneath it. Cables and a pulley system supported the pedestal as it descended into a cavernous chamber illumined only by braziers framing the egress. Logic dictated that directly below the courtroom was another level given the structure of the Ministry. Nothing magic couldn't solve, he supposed. At the bottom, an assemblage of Hit Wizards waited, presided over by half a dozen Dementors. Normally, Aurors would deliver the prisoners to Azkaban, but none were present. None of the loyalty he had won prior to his taking the Mark would benefit him now.

Harry did not rail against his fate. He had surrendered so much maneuvering himself to plant a dagger into Voldemort's back – Azkaban would be a relief.

He stared ahead unblinkingly, mind vacant.

A shout caught his attention. It was muted by the taunts and celebratory cheers that filled the courtroom. He glanced upward, and his world narrowed to that opening in the floor above. A figure was framed by the light streaming down, thin and reedy. He squinted but could not recognize the man at that distance.

"'Fraid I can't hear you, mate," he called.

There was a moment's pause.

"DID YOU KILL MY SON? DID YOU KILL HERMIONE?"

His eardrums throbbed as they were assaulted by Arthur Weasley's voice, magnified tenfold by a Sonorous Charm.

"DID YOU KILL THEM?"

His face flushed, simmering with rage. He struggled against his restraints, willing his unresponsive limbs to move.

"No!" he bellowed hoarsely, angling his head as far as the backrest of his chair would allow.

He gnashed his teeth at the question and the memory it triggered. The disastrous search for Slytherin's Locket at the Grimmauld's Place, where both Ron and Hermione had fallen to let him flee. He had yet to discover how Voldemort had breached the Fidelius Charm. One of his friends had divulged their purpose under torture, heralding the untimely end of the Horcrux hunt before it gained momentum.

He was still faithful to the cause even for the first few years after the calamity struck, but no one else knew. Or rather, none trusted his word.

"ARE YOU GUILTY?"

His silence answered for him.

A cable snapped, cut by a severing charm. It whipped through the air as the sudden loss of tension shook the pedestal. Jets of variously-hued light crossed above as the guards responded. The distraught father disappeared from view, but not before uttering another severing charm which slashed through an adjacent cable. His chair plummeted as the platform tilted vertically and entered a pendulous swinging motion.

He laughed breathlessly all the way down, tickled pink at how unexpectedly his second death had come as he began to freefall, helpless to prevent his rendezvous with the ground.

"_Arresto momentum!_"

The Hit Wizards weren't, however.

The charm terminated once he was safely a few feet above the ground and he landed in a graceless heap, his robe pooling over his head and upper body. He lay there facedown, and the Hit Wizards swarmed him as they began to unclasp the chains binding him to the chair, though they left the shackles around his wrists in their rightful place. Two men seized him under the arms and hauled him onto his feet. The rest of the company assumed their positions around them and the procession began to march towards the exit.

He hung limp and unresisting in their grip, staring at the grimy floor and deadened to the tumult erupting above, in a world he would be taking his leave of.

_I'm trying to stay sane longer than you,_ _Sirius. Am I doing it right?  
_


	4. A Grim Homecoming

**The Strangergod  
By **Melnivone_  
_**Chapter III:** A Grim Homecoming

* * *

Number Twelve, Grimmauld's Place welcomed its master without fanfare.

The grooves of fissures sprawled throughout the worn set of front steps. The battered front door bore only a silver knocker in the shape of a twisted serpent instead of any keyholes or handles. Harry grasped the heavy metal ring and pounded it against the dilapidated wood. It shuddered once and Harry stepped inside, shutting the door behind him. For a moment, he merely stared into the mass of shadows before removing his shoes. He raised his hand, pressing his middle finger against his thumb, and snapped his fingers.

Lights kindled in the gas lamps attached to the walls and the wicker of the candles seated in the chandelier ignited, illuminating the long hallway. The carpet was almost colorless, the once variegated threads faded into a listless gray. Lifting a foot off the ground, he gently thumped the wall. A faint rustling noise rebounded off the walls and cobwebs showered him. The dwelling had fallen into utter disrepair in his absence and teemed with dust and decay as it had following Sirius's imprisonment before him. He could have sworn he heard the faint squeal of vermin skittering around.

Altogether, in much better condition than he had expected.

Since officials in the Ministry were prohibited from using Fidelius Charms without permission, it was accessible to anyone with a mind to break through the rudimentary security measures.

He ambled down the hallway cautiously.

"Good evening, Harold," a patronizing voice greeted him.

He whirled around, wand drawn. Then he blinked sheepishly as he faced the portrait of the Madame Black, who examined his skinny form with a clinical expression. Unlike him, _she _had been left untouched by the ravages of time. When not shrieking at Mudbloods infesting her household, she looked rather pleasant, immortalized in her matronly years by a talented painter's brush. Her portrait was enormous, the framework towering from the ground to the banisters of the second floor's landing.

"Oh. Evening, Walburga."

"They released you," she observed, sounding pleased. "Much earlier than they did my son."

"They did indeed…"

Harry had never known his mother, but he was certain Lily would not have shunned, rejected him over a clash of ideology, like Walburga did her son. Still, Walburga had advised him and helped fashion an image that beckoned to the public conviction. He would not have won Voldemort's trust nearly as completely without her.

"No cutthroats waiting in the dark for me, right?"

"None."

"Good. That's very good."

"I expect you to devote yourself to familiarizing yourself with current events immediately. Hm. After you hire a housekeeper," Walburga added, once her eyes had swept everything that lay within her field of vision. "And reconstruct the wards."

The warding arrays were an urgent matter, he thought with a frown. He would have to purge the place of any foreign magics and disarm any traps before he could be at ease.

"Alright," Harry agreed.

He strode toward the end of the entry hall, not waiting for Walburga's approval, and descended the set of narrow stairs into the basement. The kitchen was cavernous, dominated mostly by a long wooden table where the Order of the Phoenix had convened in the past and where he had eaten in solitude for years. Iron pots dangled from the ceiling, rust accumulating on them. A silver platter gleamed dully at the center of the table and he reached for the apple gleaming amid the rotten fruit. Its skin was still polished and a vibrant cherry red, as if freshly taken from the branch.

He grasped it by the stem, conjuring a carving knife and reducing the apple to its core. It was unsoftened by age. Harry absently wiped his hands and gathered the blood-red seeds into his palm. He dismissed the knife and returned to entry hall. Then he climbed the grand staircase leading to the upper floors of the house. At the first landing, he entered the drawing room. Windows overlooked the street in front of the house and an entire wall was covered with a tapestry of the Black family tree.

The tree split into numerous branches, the Blacks marrying with the Yaxleys, Crouches, Prewetts, and Malfoys.

There were many stories in the lines tracing those branches.

And more tales lost, in the scorch marks where the names of the disowned members of the family once were.

He took loose blackened threads that bordered each blank patch and sewed a seed onto each of them, muttering an incantation under his breath. It was a relatively uncomplicated invocation rite to call the house's wards to life. He waited patiently for the feeling of ambient magic to well up from within the walls, the near-silent hum of the energies of past Black patriarchs and matriarchs manifesting themselves into a protective shell around the ancient abode.

They didn't.

Instead, a voice echoed down the halls, ringing with exaggerated formality and pompousness, the hallmark of the Ministry official.

_"Unauthorized resuscitation of familial wards is strictly prohibited by the Lords' and Ladies' Assent. Instructions to obtain approval available upon request at the Ministry of Magic. Attempts to further restore wards will be met with prosecution._"

Harry scowled, but there was a hint of resignment in his non-reaction.

What kind of deranged nonsense had been going on while he was gone? The Assent implied that the purebloods themselves had voluntarily relinquished one of their oldest traditions and most unquestioned privileges, but that didn't make any sense whatsoever. Every pureblood head of house treated his home as the most priceless possession of the family after the family members themselves; each generation contributing their efforts to strengthening the wards and making them more and more unassailable. What was responsible for this incredible development? Moreover, what force could be strong enough to drive such a phenomenal change? It was unimaginable that any faction could become strong enough in the time of his imprisonment, which was the blink of an eye by the measure of historians and the livespans of societies.

Mind wandering as he made his way to the patriarch's study, he began throwing temporary enchantments to substitute the warding platform built by the Black forefathers. He would need to find alternative accommodations to hide in until he could restore Grimmauld Place's protections. If his release was well-publicized - if it was publicized at all - people would be coming for him with knives out, and he couldn't stay awake forever.

In a way, he was expecting something of this nature. His release from Azkaban was a result of a sickened Wizarding World, but logic and the rules of probability dictated that it couldn't be the sole symptom.

He seated himself at the grand desk in the private study of Cygnus Black, unconsciously pressing his stomach against the edge of the desk to exert pressure against the hunger pangs he was beginning to feel. He hadn't eaten a proper meal in years. He hadn't had so much as tea and biscuits in forever, and he could barely remember the last time he'd enjoyed someone's company without being burdened by his deceptions and hidden intentions.

He realized he missed Molly Weasley's cooking. The meals were a residual memory scattered into pieces in his brain; a mixture of nearly-forgotten-but-not-quite flavours, scents, textures, and the sound of laughter and warm conversation. What he'd enjoyed most was that he was never alone; he was with his friends, other Order members, a big family that he had a place in. Before it was ripped apart, he remembered a time of his life that had been uncomplicated, honest and optimistic, all things that were lost to him now.

The sound of tapping on glass drew him from his musings.

He looked up at the wide-panelled window, an eagle-owl perched on the window-sill, insistently knocking its talon against the glass, a letter tied to it. He debated ignoring it outright and denying it entry, but noticed the red ribbon wrapped around the paper. It marked the letter as a general missive to all wizarding families, sent across the wizarding world when a new law was on the brink of being decided.

It was comforting that one tradition had stayed alive.

He heaved a sigh and pushed himself upright, leaning across the desk to open the latch and let the messenger bird inside. He shrugged apologetically as it looked around hopefully for owl treats and untied the letter, unfurling it.

It read:

_The Wizengamot convenes on the morrow._

_Late evening session.  
_

He pondered the wisdom of attending that session. A public appearance would be disastrous and recognition unavoidable - no glamors, no disguises to hide behind. But it would be a first step to see the political situation and the state of the Ministry firsthand. All that he needed was to exercise care, and be ready to defend himself should the need arise.

Mind made up, he rose and strode to the wardrobe. It swung open at his command, and he began vanishing the mothballs as he began searching for a suitable dress robe.

Best not be late.

* * *

**TBC**

* * *

Yup, I'm back. I ran into an intense period of real life things that killed my writing momentum while I was in the midst of writing _The Strangergod. _It's one of the rare cases where I have the plot for the story fully mapped out, and I stumbled on the file with those notes on my laptop. I'd forgotten a lot of my plans, but reading the chapter outlines and half-written climactic scenes revived my enthusiasm and put me back in the writing mood. That's why notetaking is so important, isn't it?

I'm making the most out of this recent vein of inspiration I've recently begun the rewrite of _To Define Treachery _and kicked off a new story, _These Last Days of Autumn Rain. _You should check them out too.

A big thank you to everyone that's given me input. Feedback is a huge component of what motivates me to keep writing, so please take the time (it doesn't take long at all) to review and let me know what I think.


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